Hmmm.....

I used to think that the common man's ignorance about politics and the political process was funny...then I realized that the more ignorant and vociferous they were, the much more likely it was that they'd actually go out and vote along their misguided beliefs.

Anyway...that was my little rant for the day.

Oh, yeah, by the way, whoever was crying about Skeletor being de-elected wasn't likely complaining when our E. Wash. brothers voted out the Speaker of the House to install George Numbernutt, who then turned into an absolute, undeniable, no question about it,...(insert drum roll here)... liar! (e.g., do a search on the internet, put in "George Nethercutt" and "term limit". Toss in "lying sack" and "no integrity" if you want to reduce the number of hits from 43 million to 42 million).

No one in state government is any Indian tribe's pocket. The tribes don't need them...the state cannnot regulate anything the tribes do, except in extreme circumstances, and they do when those come up.

If you couldn't guess, I generally vote for democrats. I also voted for B.A.N., and spent hours distributing signs that I picked up from their Renton office the week before the vote. Maybe I was just their token democrat...but a few of the GOP supporters I talked to then didn't want "them d@mn Injuns gettin' all the fish", so didn't want to vote for it.

Brilliant.

I'm always impressed by the amount of legal knowledge that comes from salmon fishing for 35 years and not liking Indian netting. To think, I sure wasted a lot of money for college and law school...all I had to do was go fishing and I'd have known it all.

You can't really blame resource exploitation on either party, at least not directly (in our state, G-Dub is definitely doing it on a federal level, as did Slade). Regulations have been written in the main by the exploiters themselves. Do you really think that the average representative has time to write a 200 page regulation packet regarding the technical aspects of extracting coal from 200 feet down in the ground? Do you think they hire consultants?

Here's a really simple way to see how it all happens:

Follow the money.

Who benefits from this regulation? Who wrote it? There's your culprit.

Then...see who that culprit donated a bag 'o bucks to during the last election. That's the kind of info you want when you head into the booth.

Fish on...

Todd.

P.S. I doubt that G-Dub is an idiot, but he's likely not a Rhodes Scholar, either, and I doubt that his Daddy ever had "My son is an honor student at such-and-such school" bumper stickers on his truck. He certainly isn't very quick, but that doesn't make him stupid. Just slow. If he's well-prepared and has a speech to read, he's actually pretty good. He'd look a lot smarter, though, if he'd never speak publicly without a prepared speech, as his "thinking on his feet skills" are incredibly undeveloped.